Half of Business Travelers Want to Avoid Human Interaction on the Road

Andrew Sheivachman, Skift

- Jul 11, 2017 6:15 am

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Dealing with humanity can be annoying, and it can be even worse when you’re traveling for business. More robust technology tools, however, can help automate and streamline many annoyances for business travelers.

— Andrew Sheivachman

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Business travel can be stressful, and road warriors have a solution in mind to make their lives less miserable on the road.

Half of those polled for the annual Egencia Business Travel and Technology Survey said they like to avoid human interaction when traveling for business, unless they have a problem that can be fixed.

The survey includes responses from 4,521 business travelers over the age of 18 in the U.S., Canada, Australia, Norway, France, Germany, Singapore, Sweden, and the U.K.

“Business travelers have high expectations and they want instant access to information and tools on every device,” said Rob Greyber, president of Egencia.

Two-thirds of those polled indicated they would like to book and manage their business trips across a variety of mobile devices, not just on mobile phones. At the same time, 56 percent said they want more robust mobile tools for business travel.

Despite the demand for better technology tools, most travel management companies are still working to develop a comprehensive suite of products that allow travelers to access and manage bookings across multiple platforms.

Texting, in particular, seems to be a sticking point among those polled; 48 percent overall, and 63 percent of U.S. business travelers, would like to be able to update their business travel itinerary using text messages.

Artificial intelligence is also seen as a potential solution to ease traveler pain points, with 43 percent of respondents believing artificial intelligence advances will improve their travel experience.

Following is an infographic detailing the results of the survey below.